I live in Los Angeles so I spend a lot of time in my car.

It’s illegal to use your cellphone while driving unless you’re hands free  but if you’re like most of us – your phone has become your navigation system.

When you’re driving no one wants to look away from the windscreen to look at directions, so the best thing to do is have your phone/navigation device attached either to the dashboard or the windscreen.

I’ve tried quite a few of these phone holders and they usually have a life of around 1 year.

Now I’ve only been using the Arkon for about 3 months and the I have high hopes for it.

Let me explain why.

First, there’s the build quality. The engineering on this phone holder is very good.

Like many of the phone holders out there, this particular phone holder uses a suction cup to attach it to either your windshield OR your dash. And if your dash is textured, fear not! The folks at Arkon provided a 3M adhesive disk which – according to the company – won’t leave residue on your dash and is specially formulated for temperature extremes.

Arkon says that their suction cup should work on a textured dash, but it wouldn’t stick to mine for more than 1/2 hour. But the adhesive disk they provide solves the problem nicely. Just for total transparency though, mine is attached to my windshield.

Another cool thing about this phone holder is that you can remove the clip that holds the phone, and it has a threaded hole on one side (protected by another rubber plug – I told you these guys thought of everything) that allows you to attach your smartphone to a tripod!

I’m a commercial director so I use my phone as my director’s finder and it comes in handy when I’m trying to lock the camera down or to shoot unassisted.

The one really outstanding thing about this smartphone holder is that it is solid. The arm is designed in such a way that there’s almost no wiggling or shaking as you’re driving. When you put the phone in the holder (currently I’m rocking an iPhone 6+) it’s so solid that you can do it one handed without the fear that the suction cup will come loose, or that the phone clip itself might move on it’s pivot.

And oh yeah, one thing about the pivot. The way that the clip is attached to the arm is very clever. It uses a “screw down” tightener to attach the clip itself to the “pivot ball.” It’s super easy to unscrew the “screw down” and remove the clip portion from the arm.

Price: $18

-- Fred Raimondi 03/9/16

(Other Cool Tools readers also recommend this mount. See the discussion here. — editors)